Make me pretty – Trans – mog – self gratification?

I feel pretty,
Oh, so pretty,
I feel pretty and witty and bright!
And I pity
Any girl who isn’t me tonight.

-Westside Story

Do I need to ‘feel’ pretty to play?

I haven’t been impressed with the Priest gear design in the last few seasons/tier. Other classes are getting skulls, spikes, glowing beaks, eyes and feathers. We have just been getting different version of bad 80’s fashioned shoulder pads, and they haven’t even had lace or glitter on them, add them to shadow form, and it even makes the firey feather shoulders look from Leyara’s Locket look dull.

So when I heard the news of Transmogrification I first thought WINGS! I can get my wings back.

The Avatar Regalia was my favorite set ( my holy priest figurine complaining about how high her heels are) or The Merciless Gladiators Raiment set that also had the same wings. Then all I would need is the Grand Marshal’s War Staff and I think I would be happy, and feeling pretty.

Could the appearance of my toon be enough to inject back into me a passion to play more? Love the game more ? Do I need to feel pretty to play Wow?

Once it was how others saw you in game.

I’ve known tanks that used to sit on the Bank steps in Dalaran to show off their gear. The same reason why Rogues would show off their Glaives back in the day near the then ‘it’ place on the Iron Forge bridge.

The idea in both instances was that people would look at your gear and recognise the specialness of your gear. the achievement, the rank you had earned by having those pieces. Players to envy, or maybe more so because the people who raided, ( and others – but maybe not the average player) knew what kind of work and achievement it took to get them

But if gear no longer becomes an indication of status or achievement, and more about vanity and to be honest now that I am not raiding I wouldn’t have a clue or care what top level fappable tank gear looks like now, then you may choose to dress how you feel like for the same reason why you choose clothing or accessories in real life, to show off your personality/interests/sub culture.

I want my wings!

Do I need them? Nope, is it going to make me play better, feel better, play more? – Nope.

Will it change how other people see me/ you see others? – Maybe. ” Omg – your fashion sense is so bad. No stripes with Plaid, Ahhhh you’re colour blind! Or what is your inner psyche revealing about your desire to wear a metal G String voluntarily yes those pants

But it’s all aesthetics, I knew people who would re-roll when they didn’t like their toons face or hair ( before the Barbershop) we do care about how our toons look, if it’s the colour of your gear, that you’re wearing a big blue dress or the design of the armor set, we use the Barbershop, we dress up bank alts, we collect holiday event gear sets, so even though I feel a little shallow about it, I think it will prove to be very popular.

But whats next? Your own face on your Avatar? I wrote about this possibility here

If you’re looking for some ideas of what your gear could look like , check out

Disciplinary Action who has a very good illustrated fashion guide to the cloth armor sets for the choices available for gear set looks, and where to get them.

And Big Bear Butt pointed out The Visual Role Play List for some other ideas about what you can wear, and they have promised to start posting more Transmogrification friendly posts.

6 Responses to “Make me pretty – Trans – mog – self gratification?”

This is a desperate move of milking the most out of the game, without actually developping any new content for it.

If you think about it this new functionality is quite easy to implement and taps into the very special incentive most players playing mmos have: which is vanity and social status.

To me it is still mind boggling the fact that so many people crave for such utterly vain and empty goals (such as looking pretty / having a status symbol inside a video-game) and that the activity of gaming in itself (as in playing the game being rewarding in itself) has been completely butchered by catering to this new class of “players”.

Status-seekers exist everywhere, and take part in every activity. I agree it’s annoying when they are obnoxious about it (link your legendary in trade one more time, I think somebody missed it THE OTHER 6 TIMES) but if it gives them pleasure to obtain something rare, and costs you nothing, why be upset about it? The same goes for wanting to look a certain way. If wearing t2 makes them happy then good, glad the option is available now. I don’t think I’ll be mogging my gear, partly since DK gear only goes back to t7, but why complain about other people having fun? As for blizzard “wasting time” on features like this, it’s not like their instance design team was pulled away to make the transmogrifier. We won’t see less content because of it. Seems to me like your post is overly negative for such a small, and in no way harmful to you, game change.

Thanks for the shout-out, P! I keep finding new things and going back to ninja-shove them in there (is ninja-shove a thing? it should be), but I have to say that personally, I can’t wait to transmogrify into a low-level green world drop set.

Tier 5 is defiantly my favorite. Only problem is I might have a hard time getting my current guild to do BC runs for it. I am working on Tier 1 for the time being though. I’m definitely watching what I DE now though.